Defense:
21

Utility:
0

Introduction

This is beeing updated as we speak to fit demands!

Hey everyone!
It's been a very long time since i made a guide, and the guide's i have is long due an update.
So most of my builds are archived as it stand's now!
I got back into playing LoL just recently, and when i got back, i gotta say, i was truly shattered at all the changes that have been made to all the champs i played before.
But, i didn't wanna let that discourage me.
I played for hours and hours, for several days, with diffrent champions that i wanted to get better with.
It was looking grim for some time, when i suddenly remembered a champion.

Irelia - THE WILL OF THE BLADES

This was the champion i played nonstop when she first hit the scene, and i remembered how much i loved her, her abilities, her raw damage output, her looks(they are pretty good), she also wield's blades, hovering blades even, whats there not to like?
But the problem was pretty apparent, i had no clue what i gave myself into.
It became so obvious after the first three games, i really had no clue about how i should build her properly, since the meta has changed so much, the items have changed, the tweaks to peoples abilities, so on and so fourth.
So i was left but with one choice to do!
I needed to read up on her, as i had so many questions, but i stood there with no answers!

jhoijhoi: For his how to make a guide, and for the fantastic separators, and general knowledge on coding and everything. Please look op his name and read the guide he has made.
Please read it, it's truly a work of art: How to make a Proper Guide

SirSpankAlot: For alot of great ideas on how to make a guide look more complete, colorfull and well informative. Please look up his guide for skarner, my favourite jungler: Skarner Jungle Guide By SirSpankAlot

Potatisfarfar: For some great support and ideas and demands he wanted of my guides. I have great respect for his opinions in guide makeing as he has been arround for along time and knows the general requirements, in which i need to follow!
And please check out his awsome guide for Cho'Gath Gentleman's way of playing Cho'gath

To anyone i missed, i thank all of those aswell for the great guides who have been put up here on the site, and alot of them have given me tons of inspiration!

MyLittlePony: For the Gif's and general Color Layout suggestions.

Here is a salute for everyone who supported my guides:

General Info Chapter About Irelia as a Champion(none advanced)

These are the questions i had:

What is her role?

What is her main objective; early to lategame?

What is her team-playing contribution like?

What is her Strength's and Weaknesses?

These are the answers i was given:

Role explained:

[*] She is a Melee Assasin, with an extremely high lane pressence. Starting from lvl.3, she can start harrassing her opponent very hard, and with the way i build her, using Hiten Style to keep her good and healthy, she can lane a long time without going back for refills, potions and the likes, not only that she can also hold her own against very beefy champions, like olaf, garen and many others.
Her role overall is to be an initiator for team fights, a beefy champion that people don't want to focus, but does to much damage to ignore aswell!

Main objective explained:

[*]Her main objective is to control the lane early game, contribute in what way she can after reaching the adequate level to join teamfights, this is usually lvl.6, as her ultimate Transcendent Blades does a very devastating amount of damage, aswell as healing irelia for a percentage of the damage done. Late game she is ment to initate teamfights, unless there is a more beefy champion on your team that is a designated tank. During teamfights she should hug right onto their carry, slowing it with Equilibrium Strike and focus on getting it down, remember that your Q-Bladesurge is great for catching upto and finishing of opponents, but you should always let your teams carry take the finishing blow if this is possible.

Team contribution explained:

[*]As mentioned above, she is an excellent initator for teamfights, she has a good gap closer, a slow, or stun depending on health, an aoe ultimate that does devastating damage if your placement is good, so her team contribution is to force the enemys carry into submission and keeping aggro of the enemy team, so yours come out on top!
If you can manage this then you have furfilled ur job at a good level.
(as to which level im speaking of, i mean the job level of the initator as an irelia player or off-tank player)

Strengths and weaknesses explained

[*]One of her main strengths is her Passive Ionian Fervor Which gives her alot of CC reduction on stuns, slows, and general immobilizing effects, that alot of champions have!
Not only that, she has alot of damage output from Hiten, even without huge dps increasing items, like Tri-Force and so on. Her weakness is, that she aint a huge burst dps champion like many other's are, and she aint the best off-tank either, she has fairly low damage output compared to many other champions and are sometimes overlooked because of this, but her high sustainability by far, makes up for the low damage output, meaning she can be there and do damage for a longer period of time than many other squishier champions.

Her skill sequence and abilities will be explained later in this guide

Pros / Cons

ProsSPACE[+]Super strong solo champion[+]Very durable overall champion[+]Very high defense against CC's[+]Does not need alot of items to deal Dmg[+]Is more or less unkillable lategame[+]She is a sexy beast

SPACE

SPACE

SPACE

Cons[-]Lacks the dmg many other champs have[-]Lack of CC's, only a slow[-]Hard to play properly for new players :([-]Struggles against kiters, Nidalee, Ashe, Kennen etc.

Masteries

Masteries

1/5

3/5

4/1

1/1

3/5

3/1

4/1

3/5

1/1

3/1

3/1

1/

Explaination of the masteries below:
I take the Defensive route with her because it gives her amazing substainability throughout the whole game, she gets some extra offensive damage, that she truly needs, and the defensive tree offers alot of mitigation, both early, mid and late game.
And with the hp/reg she gets through the masteries, plus the runes, she is super beefy even early game, i believe ive said this alot, but its true.

Honorguard Reduces over dmg taken by 1.5% which doesn't sound like much but it truly is more than it looks like.

Juggernaut Increase MAX health by 3%, and reduce incomming disables with 10%, that is just insane right? and then you have her passive ontop of, than mercurys treads.
That just increases ur beefynees to an inhuman state, makeing u very durable and hard to hold down for a long period of time

Skill Sequence And Explaination

Ability Sequence

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

Ionian Fervor Reduzes general immobilizes by 10%, 25% and 40% respectively, depending if there are 1, 2 or 3 champions nearby.
This is a HUGE reduction on slows, taunt, fear and everything you get thrown at you, imagine all this with mercrurys threads on you, and the masteries from defensive.
This is so much reduction people will resist blowing anything on you to immobalize you, as it will only be a waste of cooldowns.
This is by far one of my favourite passives in the game.

Bladesurge Irelia dashes forward, dealing a set amount of damage pr. rank +1 per atk damage she has, if you kill something with this ability, the cooldown also refreshes, and refuns you 35mana.
This can be used in any number of ways, depending on how you see it fit.
But it has alot of usage posibilities.

Last hitting minions, or champions?(which might be looked upon as rude for a carry)

Gap Closer to reach a champ trying to escape, or to get away if you have the ability to

Initiate fights, because it is your job

Hiten Style Passively this gives you health regen on auto attacks, and on activation, this will give Irelia's auto attacks deal upto 75 true dmg for 6 seconds, which doesnt seem high, but it actually is quite the disturbing amount
of dmg increase. This is what makes you durable in lane aswell, passive health regen, and true dmg is what makes you scary to 1v1 during laneing phase or any part of the game.

Equilibrium Strike Irelia's attack balances the scales, dealing 280 (+50% of ability power) damage at max rank, and slowing the target by 60% for 2 seconds. However, if the target has a higher Health % than Irelia, then the blow stuns the target for 1 / 1.25 / 1.5 / 1.75 / 2 seconds instead.
That is an immensely strong stun, or slow, exceptionally good for teamfights, 1v1's and everything you come up against, and can win you a fight even if you are at a low lvl.
The overall usage of this is to many to name them all, but use it as you see fit for the occation.

Transcendent Blades Irelia summons 4 spirit blades which she can fling at her enemies. These blades deal 160 (+0.6 per bonus Attack Damage AND +0.5 per bonus Ability Power) physical damage to enemies that they pass through, and she heals for 25% of that damage vs champions and 10% vs minions.
That is ALOT of healing during lategame and in teamfights, and even during laneing phases.
The usage for this, as it has so low a cooldown is many, you can use it to force your enemy laning player to stick by his turrets as you can kill an entire creepwave with this in a matter of seconds, as with Equilibrium strike, you should use this as you see fit, and when needed.

Runes

Runes

Greater Mark of Lethality9

Greater Seal of Armor9

Greater Glyph of Scaling Magic Resist9

Greater Quintessence of Health Regeneration3

Greater Mark of DesolationGreater Mark of Desolation This type of Mark increases your overall damage percentage on auto attacks towards a target, that beeing minion or enemy player. The way ARP works, is that it makes your attacks ignore the amount of armor as you have in armor penetration.
Which all in all is to good to not use on irelia.

Greater Seal of Resilience
This adds armor to your own defense, makeing you more beefy and durable.
It doesn't seem like its that much armor with only 9 runes, but you are buying a cloth armor aswell, and all of this adds upto a grand total of: 55Armor at lvl.1
And that good sir, is ALOT of mitigation, which will only become that much stronger as you level up.

Greater Glyph of Shielding MR makes you overall more resistant to caster atk's, and anything that deals ap dmg.
This makes you less of a target aswell, meaning that caster's will have to invest in getting less high caliber item's like , and rather get a to increase their overall damage, and this sort of evens out the odds for your team. So MR is a very needed stat for irelia as an initator, without it, you will simply explode in teamfights. And the reason why i dont get flat Magic resist, instead of per level, is because i lean more towards a lategame ending rather than a midgame one.

Greater Quintessence of VigorGreater Quintessence of Vigor Flat health regen, these are focused at your overall staying power in teamfights, it increases the time in which you can lane against someone, and it's simply put an amazing stat overall for any tank. For that increased health regen if you like that you can go for a Philo Stone early game, to increase mana reg, health and and give you a cute little gold per 5 seconds.
Personally i never use it on irelia as i never get any trouble as it is, and i still manage to stay long enough in lane to get my wriggle's, in which that alone makes you unstoppable in lane.

Overall Stat increase:

15 Armor Penetration

24 Magic Resist at lvl 18

55 Armor at level 1

16 Health Regen at level 1

So if you read the summary of your runes at level.1, that is some pretty amazing numbers, wouldnt you agree?
And the answer to that would be: YES ofcourse, with pink colors!
To be abit more serious, then those stats alone makes you super beefy in lane, and will only help you throughout the entire game, so before you neglect them, try them out.
They have failed to dissapoint me so far.

Summoner Spells

Exhaust: Good disable, that has alot of usage. And can make or break teamfights, if used correctly

space

Ghost: Increases your movement speed for a set amount of time, and grants the user somethign called unit walking. (makes you pass through minons/players, rather than collide)

space

Teleport: This is a viable summoner spell, as it helps you get arround easier on the map, and makes you able to help out in teamfights earlier.

-Ontop of what is written, you get both improved by a single Talent point in the mastery tree.

NONE VIABLE SUMMONER SPELLS

Items

Item Sequence

Mercury's Treads1100

Wit's End2500

The CORE of your build:

For an item that costs 1600Gold This item gives ALOT of positive contribution

A free Sight Ward every 3minutes

30Armor that add's to your overall survivability

Lifesteal that helps you further ur sustain in lane, and during the game

Tip: Activate Hiten Style and try beeing aggressive with this.
You will see the diffrence in damage scaleing very easily

So your Complete CORE build sums up to: 4800Gold
That sounds stupidly low to me, as i remember alot of builds that got items costing 4000Gold Alone. Meaning this Core is more or less 2000Gold Cheaper than alot of other builds out there, leaving room for alot of alternative routes to build Irelia to fit the job you must do.

Item Sequence

Force of Nature2610

Banshee's Veil2450

Guardian Angel2400

The Route of your build:

-Optional-This is a high armor value item that costs 2000Gold and a Unique passive

100Armor(which is add's a ton to your overall survivability

Unique passive that returns 30% of all the standard attack damage taken in magic damage to the attacker

This is by far the best item against heavy caster teams, and i do get it aboutn 75% of my games, as the defence it gives and the overall stats makes it to good to leave out

-Optional- This is a defensive item that boosts health and gives you a one spell block wonder, that can and will save your life, at it's cost is 2715Gold makeing it well worth it for the large hp boost and some mana

50MR to boost ur defense against ap abilities

Unique passive: blocks one negative spell every 45seconds

This is an allround good item to pickup, if you have to be the maintank, giving you more durability and defenses, but it's a choice you will have to make, to see if it's needed or not

-Optional- This is a survival only item, and ill explain it's benefits below. Price for all it does is 2600Gold

68Armor that boost melee atk damage, which is good

38MR which is decent but not that high, but its not bad, taken the other defensive stats it gives aswell

This item's unique passive is that; if you die, you will get revived with 750hp, and 375mana, but the cooldown is 5minutes, so this is something that might save a teamfight, or a gank on you if you overextend, but as stated, this is an optional item, and you will have to see for urself if you need it or even want it. if everything goes well you might even take it for that extra defense and passive, but i usually never get to this item before the game is over

Item Sequence

-Questionable- So this is the item most people say is a MUST HAVE item for Irelia, this is completely questionable, depending on how the game goes ofcourse, you can get this baby, but you will to have it in the core build, if you are using this guide ive written, the price for this is4070Gold Putting it on the list of the most expensive items in the game, so lets take a look at what it does

30atk speed and 30atk dmg, this is decent but not as high as one would want from a 4k item, when blackcleaver costs way less and gives more atk dmg, and more atk speed.

Unique passive: On your next ability cast, your auto attack will deal 150% of your base damage, but this doesnt stack with or

30ap, and 15 crit strike, thats not half bad, but, only your E and Ultimate would benefit from AP, and crit aint all that on irelia.

12movement speed: thats pretty good imo. But again, not that high, in increases ur mobility a tad, which is always good on an initiator.

20+hp and 250mana: Some extra health and mana is always good for any personal gain perspective

Overall: getting this item means you loose alot of defensive stats, you gain more offense, on the cost of beeing alot more squishier and easily focused, besides the 25% chance to slow, and the unique passive, this item aint worth 4070Gold to loose sustainability, lack the defense to properly engage team fights, and makeing you so much less beefy than you should be.
This is questionable as you loose some nukeing power, but this is entierly up to you.
If you can't live without the item, then by all means, use it.
But i never get it on her, and i still succeed in doing my job, dealing enough damage, and staying tanky as hell alltogether.

Farming

This Section is under construction and will be completed by 27th of November, so please check back later to see the full guide!

Summary

This Section is under construction and will be completed by 27th of November, so please check back later to see the full guide!

League of Legends is a team based, real time strategy game set in a mythical world of swords & magic where epic battles decide the fate of mystical nations. Game players take on the role of a Summoner who conjures and controls champions to fight for them at the Institute of War. During game play champions gain experience and items to enhance their skills and abilities. How players develop and play their champions can be the difference between a crushing defeat or a glorious victory!